Taxi hailing apps keep ex-army men driving happily

Deepanshu Taumar

In 2015, Ola introduced `Ola Sainik' programme in association with The Directorate General Resettlement (DGR)under the Ministry of Defence to extend an opportunity for ex-servicemen to become entrepreneurs with Ola.

| ET Bureau | Updated: Mar 25, 2017, 10:59 IST

Taxi aggregators Ola and Uber, who have had their i mage dented over la x background verification of drivers, have found a gold mine in retired defence personnel. The companies' OlaSainik and UberFauji programmes have together taken on hundreds of exservicemen who operate their vehicles on their platform. And they are a happy lot.
Ola officials said that the company plans to recruit 100,000 ex-servicemen join the Ola app as entrepreneurs by 2020. A few thousand are already with the company across 102 cities.

Uber's scheme for ex-servicemen is spread over 29 cities where the com pany operates.

Gurmail Singh, 55, a retired subedar from the army who was part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka between 1987 and 1989, is a proud entrepreneur with Ola. Singh was unfazed even when Ola slashed rates and lowered incentives for drivers sparking a strike and resumed after the storm blew over.

“The problem is for everybody; be it a driver who owns his cab or the transporters who have multiple cabs. But, they have earned decently in the beginning from these taxi hailing services. The agitation is there over the rates but it is for those who are not performing to earn incentives. The person who completes his targets is still earning handsomely.However, even if the target is not met by Rs 1, the driver will not get the incentive.The position is little tight these days than earlier, when people earned like anything,“ says Singh.

After 30 years in the army, Singh retired in 2015 and has been working with Ola.“This is the best thing. I can opt for flexible timings and high income and being a Punjabi we can drive anything we want,“ says Singh, who has been Ola's best-rated driver in Delhi NCR. He won a cash prize of Rs 50,000 and a sofa set from Ola.

With a family of four, Singh earns about Rs 70,000 from driving Ola and Rs 27,000 from Army Pension. Singh says there have been months when he has raked in 1.5 lakh.

Singh's family was into transport business in Mumbai and Delhi. After 1984 riots, the business was closed and Singh joined Army. He still owns 4 acres where his brother farms.

In 2015, Ola introduced `Ola Sainik' programme in association with The Directorate General Resettlement (DGR)under the Ministry of Defence to extend an opportunity for ex-servicemen to become entrepreneurs with Ola.The Taxiaggregator helped the ex-ser vice men with training and educ ated t hem about technology to be able to both use and respond to clients via the mobile phone.

Rajendra Shinde, who was posted in Kashmir, Rajasthan and Bhopal during his 20 years in the army was area manager for a security firm in Pune. He chucked that job to be a UberX Partner. One of his prime reasons was that after a peripatetic like as an armyman, he wanted to be with his family.

“I joined Uber because of flexible timing of work. You work for 10 hours, 8 hours or 2 hours. It's completely your choice. You can go offline whenever you want. You are your own commander,“ says Shinde. When he was working for Indian army he could not see his newborn baby boy till after six months.

Parmajeet Singh, son of a government school vice principal, served as a havaldar for 15 years in the Indian army. He now owns two cabs on the Ola platform.When he retired, he drew a salary of Rs 35,000. Now he earns a lakh rupees monthly.

On one shift I drive the cab myself, and for the second shift I keep a driver,“ says Singh, who tried his hand at a corporate job and at a time sold milk. “At Mother Dairy I found I need to sell 100 litres of milk to earn Rs 15,000 as the margin per litre was Rs 50 paise. So, I finally decided Ola was a way better option, economically. “You should enjoy work while you earn and I am able to do it with Ola.“

In Feb 2016, the late retired Major Vishwa Nath Malhotra started a transport business with two cabs attached to Ola. The intent to start the business to have a decent income and manage time. After his demise in August 2016, his son Lalit Malhotra has taken over the business and earns Rs 75,000Rs 80,000 from one cab.

Ex-servicemen seem to be happy with the arrangements with the taxi aggregators and are proud cab drivers.

“There are 19 MPs in the Canada government out them seven were taxi drivers. Also, I think that Punjabis can drive anything they want.It's in their blood,“ says an ebullient Gurmail Singh.

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